The Founding
by MegKF
Summary: When Dumbledore asks Harry to take him into the Chamber of Secrets at the start of his third year, they find something unexpected. Is the wizarding world ready to find out the truth about the founders? We're about to find out.
1. Chapter 1: Return to the Chamber

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 1: Return to the Chamber**

Harry was nervous as he sat waiting for Dumbledore to return to his office. He had been asked to go to his office after the welcoming feast, but Dumbledore had had to talk to one of the professors before meeting him. Harry was worried that he was in trouble over what had happened with Aunt Marge, or it had something to do with the dementors or, knowing his luck, had something to do with Sirius Black. Harry's eyes widened with the realization that he was already troubled by so much and classes hadn't even start yet.

A soft trill caught Harry's attention as Fawkes flew over to land on the back of the chair Harry was sitting in. He relaxed in his seat as he let the phoenix's sing take away his worries, even if it was only for a moment. That is probably why he was so startled when he heard Dumbledore clearing his throat from his seat at his desk. Harry hadn't noticed as the headmaster had entered his office or taken his seat right in front of him. Fawkes flew back to his perch in a huff.

"Headmaster, I'm not in trouble, am I?" Harry began to ask.

"No Harry," Dumbledore said with a twinkle appearing in his eye. "I actually called you here to ask a favor."

"A favor?" asked Harry confused. He wondered what he could do for the headmaster.

"Yes. You see, I wish to explore the Chamber of Secrets. Make sure Tom didn't leave anything down there for one, but also it's the first opportunity we've had at Hogwarts for centuries to learn more about the founders. We don't know what else Slytherin might have left down there."

"Oh," Harry said simply. He had never really though about what else might be down there. Of course, having the little sister of your best friend be in mortal danger while being in mortal danger yourself with a huge basilisk after you just might drive any other concerns or considerations from your mind.

"Of course I'll open it," Harry offered.

"Great!" Dumbledore said cheerfully, the twinkle more pronounced in his eyes than Harry had ever seen before. "Is it alright if we do it now? Or do you wish to settle in for the night?"

"Now is fine, Sir," Harry said softly while standing up. Truthfully he didn't want to go to bed while he was still bothered by what had happened earlier with the dementors.

"Some of the other professors will be joining us," explained Dumbledore as he wrote out some letter before enchanting them to fly. "I already asked them if they would be willing to help if you agreed. They'll meet us in the bathroom as soon as they receive their notices."

Harry simply nodded unable to think of anything to say and led the way to Moaning Myrtle's haunting place. When they arrived it was to discover the resident ghost having a fit in front of Severus Snape, who seemed very annoyed. Harry watched in awe as Snape reached new heights in volume and anger before Myrtle lost control and attempted to slap Snape. Harry's eyes widened as her hand went through Snape's head. Myrtle escaped into her toilet as Snape turned blue and reached for his wand. Harry wondered for a moment what exactly Snape thought he could do to a ghost.

"Severus," Dumbledore said sternly.

Snape spun around, startled, "Headmaster. Potter."

Harry watched as Snape took on the appearance of civility, with a slight sneer. Harry bit his lip as he tried to hold back a decidedly non-masculine giggle. It just wasn't intimidating in any way with Snape so blue. Harry spared a moment to ponder if it was because ghosts are just really cold or if it's because of the amount of time Myrtle spends in her toilet. Harry almost jumped as he realized Snape was glaring at him.

Anything else that might have been said wasn't as other professors arrived, one by one. Soon the bathroom contained not only Harry, Snape and the headmaster, but also professors McGonagall, Lupin, Flitwick, Sprout and lastly, Madame Pomfrey. Seeing his shocked gaze she gave a slight chuckle, "I don't limit myself to treating students, Harry. I can also treat professors. And when they're insisting on going into unknown places that are most likely very dangerous I insist on being nearby."

"Oh," Harry said softly, surprised.

"Is everyone ready?" Dumbledore asked.

A bunch of affirmatives followed.

"Harry, if you would," Dumbledore said looking at Harry.

Harry nodded, turned to the opening and hissed, "Open."

Soon the professors began carefully entering the Chamber of Secrets. As Harry prepared to join them, Madame Pomfrey grabbed his arm. "What do you think you're doing?" she demanded. Without letting him respond she continues, "You're staying here, where it's safe."

Snape, the last of the professors to go, sneered, "Did you think that you were needed beyond your ability to open this passageway? You're such a foolish boy." Snape seemed almost proud of his last dig before going through the opening.

Harry, who was feeling somewhat annoyed, frustrated, or something similar, turned to the school healer and asked, "How are we supposed to know what's going on?"

"That's what we have this for," she said revealing a mirror in her hand. "We'll be using this and its counterpart, which is with Professor Lupin, to communicate. See? It's already active. SONOROUS," she said with a wave of her wand at the mirror.

Harry blinked as he could suddenly hear the professors as they explored the chamber. Harry sat down on the floor, soon joined by Madame Pomfrey. They sat comfortably leaning against the clean bathroom walls as they listened to what was going on in the chamber. She explained various spells the explorers were using. Harry paid rapt attention. He never knew when he might need to know something so he mentally filed away the spells he didn't know, such as how to lift, vanish and shrink objects.

"That's the rockslide that Lockhart caused," Harry explained to the nurse.

The two sat in silence while the professors' footsteps echoed out from the mirror as they explored the chamber beyond where Ron had reached.

"Potter killed that!?" came the shocked voice of Severus Snape.

The professors' voices overlapped as they each spoke their amazement at the sight of the huge, dead, basilisk that Harry had almost died killing. Harry blushed, almost embarrassed, at the attention he was receiving, if only vocally.

Madame Pomfrey reached out and drew Harry into a sideways hug. She'd had some idea what had happed down there, since she'd finished patching Harry. Hearing exactly what had caused it made all the already overprotective instincts she had for Harry go into overdrive. Harry relaxed into the nurse's embrace. To be held in the arms of someone who was concerned about him was something he had always dreamt of in his pre-Hogwarts days. Harry relaxed as he allowed the voices of those below them to flow over him.

Harry jerked awake as he heard Professor Lupin's voice shouting out to the others, "You won't believe this."

Harry blinked his eyes to realize that he was sleeping on a cot in Myrtle's bathroom that Madame Pomfrey must have summoned. As he sat up he realized that the night must have passed them by as the light from the early dawn was starting to flood the room.

"Oh my," McGonagall said after apparently joining Lupin. "It's a bedroom. This must have been Slytherin's private rooms."

"It's getting late, or rather early," Dumbledore said, speaking for the first time as far as Harry could remember since going into the chamber. "We'll have to come back after the students go back to bed. They'll be getting up anytime now."

"Alright," came the voices of the others, each sounding either tired or regretful.

"Wait," Lupin called out before even a dozen footsteps could be heard through the mirror. "I see something."

"Is that a portrait?" asked Flitwick.

"It looks like it's a painting of Hogwarts," Lupin said as he apparently took the painting down for a closer look.

"What's that?" came McGonagall's voice.

"It looks like a couple of plaques, I can't tell what the one on the side says," Lupin murmured after a moment. "Oh my! The center one… it… it says 'The Founders'."

**End Chapter 1 **

REVIEWS INSPIRE ME

_This story is one of many that's been driving me nuts, trying to get out. I'm actually writing this whole story by hand and then typing it so it's taking awhile. This chapter actually took over a month to write and type, but hopefully that'll make this a better written story than my recently finished fic, Dinner with Voldemort. This chapter was a lot of setup… Hopefully you all liked it anyway. Next chapter: The Founders._


	2. Chapter 2: Onward from the Chamber

_Buffy is owned by Mutant Enemy and Harry Potter is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products._

**The Founding – Chapter 2 – Onward from the Chamber**

Harry waited impatiently at the opening to the chamber. Madame Pomphrey was waiting a little more patiently by his side. They were both anxious to see everyone return, though they could hear odd sounds from the mirror they weren't anything worrisome. Harry had hissed open the passage several minutes ago and was worried about what was taking so long. The passage began to close but returned to open after another hiss from Harry. Harry furrowed his brow when he considered that the doorway apparently closed automatically every 15 minutes. Harry straightened up as he heard the professors in the passage. He and Madame Pomphrey stepped away from the opening as the professors flew through it. Harry looked on as Professor Lupin and Snape, on brooms, carefully carried a painting between them. The others used their wands to help, by levitating rocks under the frame. This must have been what took them so long to return from the chamber. Harry rushed forward and took brooms from the professors as they landed so they could slowly lower the painting to the ground.

Madame Pomprey frowned as she realized how much strain the professors had been under while carrying it. "Couldn't you have just used a lightening charm?" she asked in concern as she began running diagnostic spells on them to make sure they were alright.

"No," Flitwick explained, "the painting has more protections cast on it than I've ever seen before. Neither Dumbledore nor I recognize most of them. It's very impressive." His eyes were wide and gleaming.

Harry had the disturbing though that they looked a lot like Dudley's when he was about to eat. Harry turned away not liking where his thoughts were going when he caught sight of the painted image. He stepped closer to it as he took in the beautiful landscape. It was Hogwarts and the Forbidden forest. The stones on the castle were gleaming and the landscaping was very different from what he saw when on the grounds.

"Is, is this?" Harry tried to ask.

"I believe it is Hogwarts when it was first built," Dumbledore said as Lupin and Snape leaned it against the wall. Even Snape was impressed with the detail, not that he would say anything. He and Lupin came to stand with the other professors taking it in in the light of the day. None of them had ever seen or even hear of a large magical painting like it before.

Harry blinked his eyes as he took in the details before he noticed odd details in the frame. Harry leaned in to look closer at the oddly dust free frame. "What are these?" he asked, his hand running over the strange markings.

*POF*

"Master Bumblebee," said the house elf that appeared before them, "Tizzy is here to inform master that it is time for breakfast."

"Ah," Dumbledore allowed a twinkle to enter his eye. "Let us take this painting to the great hall for the students to enjoy." Dumbledore turned towards Harry, "Will you be alright, my boy? This cannot have been a restful night for you."

"I'm fine Headmaster," Harry said with a smile.

"I made sure he slept," Madame Pomphrey said as she gently poked Lupin's arm with her wand. "Though someone else I could name overexerted himself a little."

Lupin gave her a soft, but wide grin, "I'm fine Poppy. I do know my limits."

She gave a little harrumph that was full of doubt as she moved on to Professor Flitwick. Harry grinned at this, it was nice to know he wasn't the only one she acted like a mother hen towards. Lupin, noticing his smile, smiled at him, Harry smiled back as he turned to look at the painting again, never noticing the sadness in Lupin's eyes.

Harry helped as they lifted the painting up to take it to the great hall. Harry knew the Hermione would be very excited to see the painting and tell him all sorts of facts from 'Hogwarts a History' that he wasn't really interested in but would pretend he was for her sake. It wasn't easy but with all the extra hands they were able to carry it all the way to the great hall and place it so it was leaning up against the wall of the entrance. Several students gazed at it in confusion as the teachers, and Harry, took their normal seats. Although Dumbledore stood up for a few extra moments to explain that they'd found a painting done when Hogwarts was first built.

Harry kind of tuned him out as he already knew this and was soon bombarded with questions from Hermione asking where he'd been and where the painting had come from. Harry explained shortly, without great detail as he grabbed one of the plates Ron had made for himself and claimed it for himself. Ron looked up about to protest as he realized that Harry wasn't going to be able to make himself a plate without interrupting Hermione. Ron shrugged and made himself another plate. It was only about 15 minutes into eating breakfast when there was a disturbance.

"Oh!!" cried out a seventh year girl from Hufflepuff who had been seated near the door. "There's movement!"

Several students came to join her as she rose to get a better look at the painting. They chatted loudly to each other as they examined the large landscape. As their voices rose higher it caught the attention of someone unexpected. Silence filled the great hall as they heard a voice coming from the painting.

"Rowena! I was right, we've been moved," the soft voice was surprising loud as the students stared at the painting in shock.

"I'll go get the others!" came a more commanding female voice as the student saw a small figure running towards the painting version of Hogwarts.

The teachers, as this point, had come down to join the students and so had an excellent view as a beautiful woman appeared in the frame. She smiled shyly at the gathering before her.

"Hello," she said softly, the students identified her as the first speaker from the painting. The newly risen sun in the background made her hair look like shimmering gold. Her hands were nervously clasped at the pendant she was wearing around her neck. "I am Helga Hufflepuff, it's nice to meet you all. We haven't met anyone new in so long. Not since Sal moved the painting into Salazar's chambers."

"You're Helga Hufflepuff, the founder of Hogwarts?" Dumbledore asked as he came closer to the painting, the children moving out of his way without being asked.

"Co-founder, yes," Helga nodded her head in agreement or in greeting, the others weren't sure.

"Helga," called out the woman rushing towards them. She came to a stop beside Helga. Her face was flushed, probably from running. Her long red hair flowed down to her waist. Neither she nor Helga wore traditional robes Harry quickly noted as he came to stand next to Dumbledore. They wore long dresses with robes over them. The robes were light blue and green respectively. Harry noticed several of the older male students checking them out.

"Oh, hello," the second woman called out with a light gasp, the running must have tired her Harry realized. "I am Rowena Ravenclaw. I'm glad to see someone finally moved us out of Salazar's chambers. The others will be joining us shortly," she said smiling at the confused students in front of her.

"Others?" stammered Neville, who was the first student to regain any control of his speech. Admittedly he probably had the most restful sleep of all the students since he'd been in the hospital wing sleeping off the dreamless sleep potion he'd been given after the Dementor attack.

"Of course! Godric, Salazar and Anne."

"Salazar?" several students said in unison.

Even more said, "Anne?" in unison.

"Of course…" Rowena's voice trailed off. "Oh! Yes! I'd forgotten how much has been forgotten about us. Anne is Salazar's wife."

"But this painting is from the time of the founding of Hogwarts," one student's voice was heard over the strange lull in sound.

"Yes it is."

"I think he means why isn't she considered a founder as well, Rowena," Helga said softly. "Anne was very busy helping to set up Gringotts while we were setting up Hogwarts. I believe she is probably the only human to reach such heights in the magical banking industry. Most of the original contract work they did was designed by her. She did get us a great deal of financial aide in setting up Hogwarts. Things like accounts for teachers, student scholarships. She's always been a demon where money is involved."

Rowena let out a loud giggle when she heard that. The students were staring at them both in amazement. Some let out slight gasps as three figures approached them in the painting. An older gentleman wearing glasses, a young man and another woman. All three weren't wearing robes, indeed the two younger people didn't even appear to have on nearly as many clothes as the others, in fact they looked like they'd dressed in quite a hurry.

Rowena turned to them with a large smile. "Isn't it wonderful? We're out of your chambers, Salazar."

"It is indeed," Salazar, the young man said with a small smile. "How I wish we'd enchanted the painting to remain in the great hall. Even I can get sick of my private chambers when I don't get to meet anyone new."

"Private chambers?" Harry asked.

"My grandson Sal renamed them my secret chambers, like everyone hadn't know where they were until then. He even converted the entryway into a bathroom."

"What about your basilisk?"

"It was kept in hibernation until Sal accidentally turned it off when leaving the chamber the last time. There wasn't much I could do for her inside this painting."

"You wouldn't believe the nonsense he started spreading about me. … Well actually I suppose you would since that's probably all you've ever heard about me."

"You mean things like being a blood purist?"

"That would be quite hypocritical of me," he said with a lopsided grin.

Harry's eyes widened as he caught the meaning of what he'd just said and blurted out, "You're not a pureblood?"

Salazar leaned forward, his hands resting on what was the inside frame of the painting, with a slight smirk he announced, "I'm not even a wizard."

Those gathered around the painting were all in various stages of surprise and shock, though some hid it better than others, *cough*Dumbledore*cough*

"That's part of why my house trait is cunning. It takes a lot of cunning to make it in the magical world without a drop of magic within you."

"But, but," stuttered Draco trying to right his rocked world.

"If it makes you feel better," Anne said coming forward and wrapping an arm around her husband, "I am a pureblood… Although I suppose you would call me a blood traitor what with my marrying a muggle and all."

"And the rest of you," Draco demanded.

Rowena and Helga exchanged looks before Rowena spoke up, "I'm muggleborn, to my knowledge there has never been another witch or wizard in my family. Helga is a half-blood, she inherited her magic from her mother."

"I'm a mixed blood," Godric said speaking up for the first time. "Various members of my family have been magical for centuries, but we didn't care that much about keeping our blood pure, as long as those we married were accepting of magic."

"But what about being a parseltongue?" Hermione asked. "How could you have the magically inherited ability to talk to snakes without any magic?"

"The ability to talk to snakes was part of a curse gone wrong," Salazar explained with a frown. "Magic has always acted odd around me. Rowena has a lot of theories about that."

"What kind of curse can give someone that kind of ability, I've never heard of anything like the happening before," Hermione asked, her eyes focused intently on Slytherin.

Harry coughed gently, "It has sort of happened before Hermione."

Hermione's focused gaze moving away from the painting to Harry.

"I wasn't born with this ability you know, it's a side effect of surviving the killing curse."

Hermione blushed slightly at having this pointed out to her.

"Then perhaps you're one of my descendants," Salazar said turning to focus on the young boy standing next to the man he knew had to be the current headmaster.

"Your current heir is Voldemort," Harry said simply as he ignored the many shudders around him.

"That doesn't mean you aren't my descendant. Anya and I had four children. Each one of them chose to be the heir of one of us," Salazar gestured to the others in the painting. "Just because the descendant from our oldest, Daniel, chose to follow the dark arts doesn't negate the children who chose to be the heirs of the others."

"Indeed," Godric said softly while cleaning his glasses, "I might be mistaken but you indeed look like young Alexander. His eyes were most distinctive, just like his fathers'."

"My mother was muggleborn."

"Alexander's sister was a squib. You could be a descendant of hers."

"Huh?"

"My daughter, Hailey, was Godric's heir. She had two children, Alexander and Rose. Rose had no magic. She eventually fell in love with a muggle and left the wizarding world. She made the decision to cut all ties from magic. We respected that."

"But wasn't it weird letting your children be claimed magically by others, even if they cared for them?" Hermione asked as she tried to process in all this new information.

"But we are family," Godric explained. "My daughter became good friends with Salazar and Rowena when we moved into their village."

"Godric became like a father to us," Salazar interrupted. "My own father was the town drunk and Rowena's father was a doctor who was rarely home."

"After my daughter, Elizabeth, died," Godric continued, "we all came here and I adopted both Salazar and Rowena as my children."

"Which is why," Salazar concluded, "we had no problem with our children being labeled heirs to the others."

**End Chapter 2**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME AND I NEED INSPIRATION TO WRITE MORE OF THIS!!!_

_So many names that will probably appear only the once. I wrote about half of this the month after the first chapter was published but had trouble filling in scenes. There is so much more to this, but that can wait until chapter 3, if I try to fit more in this then it'll be another year before I finish it. Over a year to write chapter 2. I am so sorry!!!_


	3. Chapter 3: More on the Founders

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 3 – More on the Founders**

Severus Snape glared at the painting, he could feel his students confusion over what was being revealed and he did worry about them. He did his best to make sure that they'd think for themselves as much as possible and hopefully not make the mistake he and many of their parents had made, following a dark lord, without letting on about his own disloyalty to him. But Salazar Slytherin being a muggle was something that wouldn't fit into their beliefs at all. Besides, how did they even know about the stuff that supposedly happened since they were in the chamber. The Dark Lord would never have told them this and he was the only one to enter the chamber since then.

"How do you expect us to believe this?" Snape drawled out as he stalked forward, his snakes moving out of his way and crowding in behind him, as if his presence could stop their foundations from crumbling. "If you've been locked away from everything for so long how do you even know how this supposed grandson of yours even re-wrote history."

Salazar raised an eyebrow as he took in the man before him. "Rowena is brilliant, one of the most brilliant people I have ever known, you think this painting is like those portraits you see hanging around this castle, you're wrong. This… This is beyond what you could possibly be imagining. We spent over a decade working on this, enchanting it. Rowena insured that as long as Hogwarts stood we'd be kept up to date. Every book brought into the library, every publication, all of it, we would have as part of our own library. Why do you think that we speak 'modern' English? Though, if you like, we could talk with 'thee's and 'thou's."

"That's not really all there is to it," Anne said speaking up.

"But it's all they need to know now," Salazar said, his own piercing gaze moving from Snape's to Anne, his eyes softening. Anne smiled lovingly up at Salazar, several older girls thought it was sweet that they were still so obviously in love after spending centuries together.

"What kind of charms are on it?" Flitwick asked, he was far in the back and no one could really see him, but they knew his voice.

"Many of our own creation," Godric said putting his glasses back on. "We'd rather not share that as fools could use it to damage us, the consequences could be far reaching."

Dumbledore frowned, "You truly are dissimilar from any portrait I've seen. Most of them don't go beyond what they did in life."

"Magical portraits were designing by one of my heirs, before we were sealed up, she found this," Godric gestured around him, "fascinating and made her own version, but those painting are simply impressions magically sealed onto canvas. We're really in here."

"You're a Horcrux?" Dumbeldore's voice couldn't withhold the disgust he felt on that idea. He'd begun to suspect that Tom might have made at least two of them to ensure his immortality, the diary Harry had destroyed the year before being one of them.

"A Horcrux! A Horcrux is a bloody perversion of what this is!" Godric said in outrage. "This," he continued softer," this is a failsafe."

"A failsafe?"

"My daughter died because some idiot thought it would be a great idea to rip a hole through dimensional barriers. It created a doorway, if you will, one that allowed beings that could only be described as demons to walk the Earth. We five were the ones to hold back the tide of invaders." Godric turned away, Salazar reached over and rested a hand gently on his shoulder.

Rowena continued the explanation, "Because the doorway was so new we eventually found a way to essentially plug it up, but we knew that it wouldn't hold forever. So we created this painting, where the five of us would remain until it breaks. So far it's holding strong, stronger than we ever thought it would. If it remains the way it has it'll be several thousand years still before it breaks."

"Even if it's not a Horcrux," Dumbledore said staring at Rowena, "to create something like this costs a life, possibly five."

"And those lives were our own. When Salazar's youngest child graduated we," Rowena looked at the young audience before her and chose her words carefully, "entered the painting."

Dumbledore looked around the great hall, as if really noticing for the first time all the young eyes and ears paying attention to what was going on before them. "Students! To your dormitories, classes have been canceled for today." When most of the students just stared at him, he spoke again, "Prefects, guide your classmates."

A couple of the prefects snapped out of it and started by getting their other prefects to help guide their classmates back to their dorms. A couple of the more calculating ones started to plot out how to use what they'd just found out to their advantage while others, the ones who could still think, wondered how they'd tell their family outside of Hogwarts about this.

"Can I stay?" Harry asked quietly from beside Dumbledore.

"My boy, I think you should let us deal with this."

"You should let him stay," Salazar interrupted. "If he's anything like I was at that age he'll find out about whatever you want to talk about anyway. And most likely not in the way you wanted him to find either."

"What do you mean?" Godric asked Salazar, the students filing slowly past them, some lingering for a chance to listen to them some more. Harry stayed put.

"Remember when all of you wanted to leave me behind on the vampire hunting because I was the normal one? The one without magic, which isn't fair because my ex-girlfriend was still involved with you all and no one knew she was going to become a seer. I end up showing up and saving you all from zombies, while you were dealing with the evil sisterhood you hadn't told me about."

Snape frowned as he moved closer to the painting, his students leaving him, knowing he'd tell them anything important if they wanted to know. He crocked his head a little to the side, most people wouldn't have even noticed it was so little. "So you hunted zombies, vampires and," Snape sent a quick glance from the corner of his eye to one of his fellow teachers, "werewolves?"

"Vampires almost always, zombies usually, werewolves rarely," Salazar said softly. "Most of the vampires we dealt with were evil. We only let a couple of them go."

"Sometime I regret not killing HIM when I had the chance, no matter how my daughter felt about him," Godric frowned fiercely.

Rowena had spent this time slowly moving her hands to her hips and stalked forward until she was centered in the painting, "And what do you have against werewolves?" She glared at Snape. "You think they wanted to be bitten? Oh sure there are some that enjoy being werewolves, but that is no way to treat them all like second class citizens! They're human almost all the time!"

Helga came forward and gently wrapped an arm around Rowena's shoulders, "It's alright Row. He didn't know."

"I was almost attacked by a werewolf!" Snape said furious. How dare she act like it was just a blind hatred.

"So was I! The evil werewolf that wanted my boyfriend! He!…" Rowena's voice trailed off. She might not have been in love with him anymore, but she still thought of him fondly.

"Rowena used to be in a relationship with a werewolf. She was there for him after he was bitten, she was there for him when he killed another werewolf to protect her," Salazar explained softly, watching Rowena softly. "Daniel was an incredible man, his being a werewolf didn't matter to us as long as he wasn't out attacking people during the full moon. After he killed the werewolf that was after Rowena he left us all. He didn't want to accidentally hurt Rowena. By the time he'd found the peace he'd looked for Rowena had met Helga, and had found peace of her own."

BANG

Harry jumped slightly as the doors to the Great Hall closed.

"You dated a werewolf?" Lupin asked in the silence that followed.

"I loved Daniel, he broke my heart when he left. I didn't care if he was a werewolf or that he'd killed another werewolf to protect me. It took me awhile to get over it. Helga was guiding light," Rowena gazed into Helga's eyes. They smiled at each other as the people gathered around the painting suddenly realized why they'd each taken one of Salazar's children as their heirs instead of having some of their own.

"I know it hurt him so much when he came back and I'd moved on. He'd spent so much time meditating, learning herbs to stop himself from transforming, that he learned to control the wolf only to loose me forever."

"He could control the wolf?" Lupin asked as hope filled his heart.

"Yes."

"Can you tell me how?" Snape asked giving Lupin a quick glare. "I'm trying to find a cure."

Rowena smiled softly. "Of course. I'm sure Daniel would be happy to know that all his work helped others."

**End Chapter 3**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_I told you that reviews would help me write more of this story, and I was right! Thank you! I hope everyone can tell now how this ties in with Buffy. ^_^ Next chapter- Flashback!_


	4. Chapter 4: The Flashback: Where are we?

_Buffy is owned by Mutant Enemy and Harry Potter is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products._

**The Founding – Chapter 4 – The Flashback: Where are we?**

Xander almost dropped Anya as he saw Buffy falling from the metal heap Glory's minions had constructed. He rushed forward, little noticing as Giles and Willow, holding Tara's hand, did so as well. But only the most oblivious of people, those who suffer from Sunnydale syndrome, wouldn't have noticed as the dimensional rifts sealed up, like the ripples caused by tossing a stone into a calm pool of water, only backwards. It was only moments after they arrived at her body that Giles looked up at the others telling them she was dead. Suddenly they were surrounded by a green light that caused them to shiver and shudder at the feeling as the were consumed by the light.

Xander blinked away the spots in front his eyes as he looked around at the unexpected trees surrounding them all. "What the?"

Giles, being the most logical of them all, spoke up as he processed the most likely explanation. "We've been taken away by one of the dimensional rifts."

"But this wasn't mentioned by the research," Willow said, speaking up as she pulled Tara closer to herself.

"No one has ever actually experienced this happening before," Giles explained as he removed his glasses and started cleaning them. "No matter what you all think, Watchers don t know everything. We can only guess at some of the consequences due to records of similar events."

"Oh," Xander said dumbly as he sat down suddenly. Anya let out a little oomph of her own as she was suddenly in Xander's lap.

"Buffy isn't here," Willow said as she looked around, as if expecting Buffy to walk out from between the trees.

"Buffy is dead," Giles said softly. "If there really is a heaven then I know she must be there."

"Then where are we?" asked Willow as she took in her surroundings. Trees trees and more trees

"I don t know yet," Giles said as he returned his glasses to his face. "But we'll figure it out. Together. Like we always do."

Xander shivered as his arms tightened around Anya. Wherever they were they'd have to do it without Buffy.

"But we'll figure it out. We always do."

"With Buffy's help," Xander couldn't stop himself from saying.

"I know," Giles sighed softly and mournfully. He had loved Buffy like a daughter and loosing her hurt.

"What about Dawn?" Willow asked. "Buffy died to save her and who knows what will happen to her now. She's lost her mother and sister and even all of us. What if Glory still goes after her?"

"There isn't anything we can do," interrupted Anya. "We'll just have to rely on Spike to do the right thing."

"And Ben didn't survive the fall from the tower," Giles shared. "Glory's dead too."

It was only Xander who noticed the undertone to Giles' voice. He looked at Giles and suspected there was more to this story but wouldn't say anything in front of the girls.

"Right then," Xander said getting up off the ground and then giving Anya a hand up. "We need to find out where we are and if we can find a way home. Hopefully Spike can handle the Hellmouth while we're gone. And I can't believe we're relying on Spike to protect the world."

"If there is one thing I'm sure of," Willow said softly, "is that Spike really does care about Buffy and Dawn. He'll keep her safe even if that means protecting the whole world too."

"Alright," Xander sighed. "Which way are we going then?"

"That way," Tara pointed towards her left. "That way feels right to me."

"Ok! Lets go."

The five of them walked in silence, each lost in their own thoughts. Xander holding Anya's hand while Willow clasped Tara's. They each worried about those they loved as they wandered out of the forest.

Two weeks later they gathered again. They had been meeting everyday about what they had discovered in the small village they had wandered into. Well, all of them except Giles who had left a week ago to find London. They been surprised to realize they were on Earth, although in the past, and apparently in the land of future tweed. Giles had gone to see if he could contact the Watcher's Council which had already been located in London as far as they could tell from the date.

Anya fingered the ring on her hand. She had been touched to know Xander had kept the engagement ring he'd gotten before the battle with Glory. When she'd found it changing clothes she had confronted him and they soon found themselves engaged.

The four stood in the forest where they'd first been dropped into this world. They gathered here periodically. They found comfort in spending time together, just them. They did hope to see Giles back soon though. They knew it would take him awhile traveling to London by horse. It gave them the chance to mourn Buffy, it gave them a sense of comfort to just be them. It had taken some magically intervention from Anya to make them sound like the native population to help them blend in. And it hadn't been easy since, for one thing, they were a little taller than almost everyone, so they were very noticeable. And with the exception of Anya didn't have any experience with the modern home. The lack of a bathroom was not an enjoyable experience make, especially for Xander who was living with three women. The village they'd found was small and it was only by telling them that Xander and Willow were Giles' children and that Anya was Xander's wife and Tara her sister that the village didn't freak about their relationships. They were all very old fashioned.

They were actually surprised at how easily the villagers were at accepting them, especially given the time frame. Witch hunts, suspicion towards outsiders that should have been the norm. At least Xander thought so. History had never been his thing. With Giles away they were relying a great deal on Anya, only she was a demon for most of this time period and part of her powers had been to blend in. She'd only known the spell she'd used to help them blend in now because of some half human demon she'd traveled with a couple of times. Still this seemed a bit weird and they were getting pretty worried about Giles. The four sat down in the grass where they'd first arrived and remained there now just sitting silently. The four were surprised at how they could just be with each other with and without words.

They jumped as they heard a branch snap and walking towards them was a snake. A demon snake, what with it walking and not slithering. It hissed at them before crouching down on it s legs before leaping at them. Xander screamed as its teeth bit into his arm. It was Scooby teamwork that saved him Xander declared later. The girls each leapt into their own appointed role. Anya pulled a screaming Xander away with a strong pull. Willow threw a fireball and Tara began treating Xander who lay on the ground having passed out fairly quickly given the pain. As Anya racked her mind to see if she knew anything about this demon, Willow began casting protective spells to keep any other demons out, at least the ones who could be affected by it, as well as wards that would tell her if anyone approached. Tara was sitting on the ground watching the demonic venom infiltrate Xander's body. She began chanting words she vaguely remembered from he childhood that her mother had sung to her when she was sick. Tara sent her magic out while still singing and forced as much of the poison back out of Xander's wounds. Anya and Willow each began to help as well they could. This was after all Tara's area of expertise.

It was a bit of surprise when Xander sat up five minutes or so after the demon was vanquished. It was a larger surprise that when he sat up he was hissing instead of speaking like he normally did. The women stared at him as he attempted to examine the bite mark on his arm. This was difficult given that Tara and Anya were both holding it still. Xander looked up at them, "Well?"

Willow frowned, "Well what?"

Xander looked at Willow who was almost hidden from his view behind Tara, "What's the damage?"

"Xander? Aren't you worried about the hissing you were just doing?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Xander you've been hissing since you woke up until now!"

"I was not!"

"You were!"

"I wasn't," Xander looked to the other girls to back him up, the looks on their faces telling him that Willow was probably telling the truth.

"I swear I thought I was speaking English," Xander said as a sense of panic began to come on.

Tara released Xander's arm and came around to hug him from behind. Willow moved around so that she too was holding him.

"Am I going to turn into a demon or something?" Xander asked about to hyperventilate.

"No no," Tara assured him. Her abilities to see auras helping her. "I promise you I see no signs of you not being human."

"But but," he stammered out. "You all said I was talking differently, like a snake."

"I think its more like an aspect of a demon," Anya said speaking out as she continued to study the bite marks on Xander's arm before releasing it and moving next to him. She decided to give up trying to identify the demon for now, comforting Xander taking precedence.

"Like when Buffy was telepathic? That got stronger and stronger until she couldn't not hear everything! Am I going to loose the ability to speak English? I don't want to not speak English!"

"Shh," Willow shushed him softly trying to calm down her friend. "We'll figure it out, we always do. It'll be alright. We'll make it right, no matter what."

"I don't think it'll be that bad, we got most of the venom out," Tara said.

It took over an hour for them all to be calm enough to return to the village. Tara allowed a soft frown to form on her face as Anya and Willow each held onto Xander as they preceded her back to the village. She gazed back for a moment at the charred remains of the snake demon that was slowly evaporating before rushing forward to hold onto Willow's free arm.

It was days later before they fell into a new routine. Xander couldn't stop speaking the language of snakes when he wasn't talking directly to another human. It was made worse when they discovered it was also apparently an STD since after a very memorable night for Anya she discovered she could understand Xander when he was talking snake. Tara did some aura checking and had decided that Anya's ability wouldn't advance much more. Anya hadn't been happy about the new limits to her own talking, they'd made all sorts of limits when they'd first arrived do to the nature of Anya usual conversations. On the bright side to Xander and Willow's opinion, Tara ended up having to do most of the talking, she was the least likely to accidentally start a witch hunt after all, and it had done wonders for her confidence.

**End Chapter 4**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME_

_Interesting fact: I wrote this on my cell phone. I've been e-mailing this to myself one paragraph at a time while on break at work._

_I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, I think there will be a couple chapters of flashbacks… I was going to do this in one go but that'll take forever since I'm putting a lot more into the flashback than I thought I was going to. Still, the origin of parselmouths!_

_So… Chapter 5: More of The Flashback, Sunnydale Aftermath, or more Harry Potter? Which do you want next? It's not often I can offer a choice of what part of a story I can write next. In fact this is the first time._


	5. Chapter 5: The Flashback: Decisions

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 5 – The Flashback: Decisions**

Giles rode his horse with great urgency. He'd been away from the children for too long, but he had had to be sure before returning to them. He didn't even want to wonder what they'd gotten up to in his absence. He smiled as he caught sight of the house at the outskirts of the village. He slid off the horse as they stopped by the house. He paused for a moment as he regained his bearings, it had been a long time since he'd ridden horses so much and he wasn't as young as he used to be.

He looked around in surprise as he noticed a significant change in the décor of the house. There were herbs tied up in various combinations all over the house and there were now weapons on display every which way he looked. "Hello," he called out. He smiled as he saw the others rushing from different directions and he was soon enveloped in a huge hug and surrounded by babbling. He frowned for a moment as he thought he heard hissing.

"We need to talk, you wouldn't believe what I found out in London."

There was some exchanging of looks that sent a nervous quake through Giles.

"We have some stuff to tell you that you won't want to believe," Xander finally said.

"Oh dear," Giles reached up and rubbed his forehead wishing he hadn't lost his glasses and wasn't likely to be able to get new ones. He wondered to himself if anyone even knew how to make glasses yet. He'd have to figure it out for himself. He could be the world's first optometrist. Yay… Giles decided in that moment he spent too much of his time with people much younger than himself, he was even beginning to think of himself as Giles instead of Rupert.

It took Tara only a few minutes to get everyone settled onto the still somewhat uncomfortable benches in the kitchen. She went about making tea while the others started talking.

"Alright," Giles began after a moment of thought. "We're in a parallel world of some kind. I've been to London and there isn't a Watcher's Council although it should already be located there. I've been looking around and there appears to be a couple of magical species. It took me awhile to locate them but there are at least werewolves, vampires, goblins, and even witches. They aren't the same as the ones we're used to so we don't need to worry so much about them I suppose. The goblins informed me that there are other species out there, they've had contact with a lot of them. I had to give them my watch for this information by the way. They'd never heard of a slayer, werewolves only change one night during the full moon, vampires don't change too much from their human selves once turned, and humans need wands to do magic." Giles let out as a sigh as the others took in this information. "We don't have to worry about accidentally changing the time line but without the council I have no idea how we'll find our way home."

"Well," Xander said filling the silence formed when Giles finished his summation. "We have some news too, which is probably bad considering… There's a hellmouth forming in the forest where we first landed. We've had several demons come through it in the past couple of weeks. Willow's magically monitoring it so we'll be notified if anything else comes through, but we've never seen a couple of these demons before. If we can't figure out a way to seal it we can't leave, especially if there isn't a slayer to watch over it."

"So we're stuck here?" Anya asked bluntly.

"Looks like it," Xander replied to the nods from the others.

Tara sighed as she set down the tea in front of them. "We're going to have to find a way to seal the hellmouth, right now it's open and letting things in without care. We're just lucky that things are only finding their way through accidentally. We have no way of knowing how long it'll take before entire dimensions know about it. This world wouldn't stand a chance against some of the things we've run into in Sunnydale. Several of the villagers have been killed by things before we could get to them. Some of them are looking at us oddly, it's only because of the ones who realized we saved them that they haven't tried to lynch us or something."

Giles blinked as he took in the uncharacteristically forthright talking of Tara before nodding. "She's right. This village is pretty small, do you think we can convince the people here to leave? Move somewhere safer? Then we could set about contacting some of the magical beings of this world and see if any of them could help us."

A full debate soon erupted between the scoobies of the new world as they discussed everything they'd discovered about their new home. From Giles' trip to London and Xander's new language skills to plans of how to protect this Earth from a danger only they knew, and how they could do that without the resources they had before.

The next day they began to put their plans in motion. It didn't take much to convince the villagers to leave, they were still living in a superstitious time and the odd disappearances and mutilated bodies that had recently started to turn up disturbed them greatly. It wouldn't be long before all the villagers moved away. Giles, Willow and Tara all started working together to create a seal on the new hellmouth while Anya started negotiations with various magical beings native to this world. Xander began his own project that he knew would surprise the others.

"We should change our names," Willow announced suddenly. The others looked at her from their spots around the dining table.

"Why?" Xander asked puzzled.

"Well, we might have counterparts that exist someday, and this is a new world and we should be new us'is. We're starting fresh, starting over, and it'll help us consider ourselves of this world instead of the other one."

"Alright," Giles said. "We might need new identities, it'll be helpful too if we run into demons that can effect people if they know your true name."

"So what should we call ourselves?" Willow asked. She might have thought it was a good idea but she hadn't really planned on the others agreeing so quickly.

"Well Giles still has to be a G name," Xander said with a firm nod.

"Why?" Giles asked as he turned to look at the young man beside him.

"So I can still call you G-man," Xander explained as if that explained everything. Sometimes Giles forgot how young they all still were, and then Xander would say something like that.

Giles let out a snort, "Alright. I'll name myself… Godric. It's an old family name."

"Godric, I like it," Tara said with a soft smile before blushing and looking down a little.

Willow smiled and wrapped an arm around Tara's shoulders. "So what about everyone else?"

"Anne," Anya said simply. "It'll be easy to remember and Xander can still call me Ahn without anyone thinking it's weird."

Xander let a goofy grin develop on his face before wrapping his arm around Anya. Giles smiled as he looked at the two happy couples before him. It no longer hurt him to see others in a happy relationship.

"Something similar but not the same," Willow mused softly thinking. "Then I want to be Rowena, after the rowan tree like I am, was, Willow from the willow tree."

"That's great," Xander said. "If only I could think of something."

"It'll come to you," Willow said smiling. "Maybe we should come up with last names too while you think about it."

Tara nodded as she too wasn't sure what to name herself.

"Well," Xander looked at Will-Rowena, "I think you should be Ravenclaw."

"Why?" Rowena asked.

"Because of your necklace, that demon looked like a gigantic raven, reminded me of Edgar Allen Poe. And you kept its claw as a weapon that you can safely wear without anyone realizing how dangerous it is."

Rowena looked down at the necklace in question. She'd barely been able to defeat the demon when it had come through a couple of days before. It'd killed one of the villagers before she'd been able to use a fireball to kill it. It had dissolved afterwards as some demons were want to do, leaving behind the claw Xander had cut off with his axe. Rowena had since discovered that it was a useful weapon, it looked like a delicate crescent moon shaped gem and Xander had been easily fashioned her a chain to attach it to, but it could pierce almost anything if you put a little magic into it.

"It's magical, beautiful, and dangerous, just like you Rowena," Xander said as he continued to try to convince Rowena of the name. "Plus Rowena Ravenclaw sounds really cool."

Rowena giggled, "It sounds good to me too."

"Great!" Xander said as he ran out of things to say and had to think about what to name himself again.

"Then I want to name you," Rowena said as an idea came to her. "I think your last name should be Slytherin, because you can talk to snakes."

Xander nodded, he wasn't particularly fond of the idea but certainly couldn't think of anything better for himself.

Anne smiled, "That makes me Anne Slytherin. I like it."

"You know we could pick out animal like names for ourselves," Tara said softly. "Like Rowena is RAVENclaw. And now Xander and Any-Anne are Slytherin."

"Alright," Godric agreed. "But I don't know what to name myself."

"How about Gryffindor," Tara suggested. "Some people believed that griffins are protectors from evil. That suits you I think."

"Godric Gryffindor," Godric said trying out the name before nodding.

"And it means I can call you G-man for sure," Xander said with a grin.

"Our names seem to have alliteration in it," Rowena chirped in with realization.

"Alliteration?" Xander asked, he'd never paid much attention in English class.

"When the first consonants of words are the same. The Rs for Rowena Ravenclaw and the Gs for Godric Gryffindor."

"Then I should pick an S name?"

"Yeah."

"Sander."

Anne giggled, "How about Salazar?"

"Salazar Sytherin. Salazar and Anne Slytherin. Me likeys."

"So now I just need to figure out a name for myself," Tara frowned unable to think of anything.

"How about Helga?" Godric said as he saw the others struggling for a name. "It's Norse meaning blessed."

Tara shrugged, it was an alright name and she couldn't think of anything else. "Alright."

"Hufflepuff," Salazar said softly.

Helga looked at Salazar in confusion, that wasn't any animal she'd ever heard of.

"It's similar to a brand of stuffed animal I had as a kid. It comforted me as a kid, when my parents argued."

Helga smiled softly as Salazar, of all those she'd met in Sunnydale he was the one with the most similar childhood. "Then I'd be honored to take that name. I'm Helga Hufflepuff."

"There won't be any confusion with any of the people we've been communicating with, will there?" Rowena asked Anne.

"There shouldn't be, I've only been using the name 'Anya,' no one should really notice if I change it to Anne. I can blame some of it on poor penmanship. I've only met the goblins in person, I've never mentioned any of you by name and Godric never introduced himself when he was spoke to them."

"How is that going?" Godric asked. He'd had a terrible time dealing with the goblins but of all the magical beings he'd run into they'd been the most knowledgeable.

"Great!" Anne smiled widely as she cuddled closer to Salazar. "We've been discussing building a bank for the magical community. The idea of making money while having guardianship of other people's money is something that really appeals to them. I've already made us a ton of money."

"That's good," Salazar said resting his cheek against the top of Anne's head. "I've got an idea I want to run by you later that might involve spending some of that money. I don't want to share it with everyone until I'm sure it'll work."

"Alright."

**End Chapter 5**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_Hardly anyone seemed to care about what I wrote next so I just continued the flashback. This is a lot longer a flashback than I thought it would be, there will be at least one more part to it. A parallel universe, a hellmouth, and how their names came to be. Hope you liked it. I'm trying to finish this, wish me luck. I'm curious, do people want me to write this story to some sort of final battle? I hadn't planned on that originally._


	6. Chapter 6: The Flashback: New Beginnings

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 6 – The Flashback: New Beginnings**

Salazar stood watching from the doorway as Anne worked on finishing her paperwork. He loved watching her in her element, she was incredible at making money. The focused look on her face, the way her hand flew over the paper making notes, how she signed things with a graceful flourish. He smiled widely, he loved how happy she was. And he'd never known her to be happier than she was now. They were married and she was the first president of a major bank. Not just the first for this bank, but the first major bank in 'modern' times. He wasn't sure which made her happier and honestly that didn't bother him at all. Salazar knew most men wouldn't enjoy having their wife be more successful, knew that most would want to know they were more important than their job, but Salazar had no reason to make her choose.

Anne looked up as she signed the last paper and placed it in her out basket. She bounced to her feet in excitement as she rushed into the arms of her husband. Salazar swung her around before setting her on her feet. He reached down and kissed her passionately. They'd worked so hard to reach this point in their lives. They'd been in this world for over a year and they were making waves of all sorts in the magical communities. Anne gasped for air with a soft smile as Salazar let up on his kiss. She giggled slightly as they each wrapped an arm around each other and set out from the bank into Diagon Alley. This was something Rowena was very proud of for accomplishing with Anne. Together they had converted what was a small magic market into a whole area in London hidden from the eyes of the non-magical community right next door.

The five of them were making changes to the magical community, and a lot of the magical community was embracing it. There were some old fuddy duddies who weren't happy, especially with a muggle's involvement in it. Salazar got a kick out of proving them wrong. He actually fit in better than some of the magicals that occasionally set up shop nearby. Between their work in Diagon Alley and their work in their old village the magical society of the British Isles was actually taking shape.

"Come on Salazar! Rowena told me she managed to figure out how to make ice cream and now there is a shop selling it."

Salazar smiled as Anne's grasp slipped from his waist to his hand and dragged him away.

ELSEWHERE

Rowena looked up from her notes as Helga made a little 'ah-hah' type noise.

"Figured out something?"

"I think so," Helga grinned looking over at Rowena. "Salazar came up with some interesting ideas and I think I know how to enchant the doors for his rooms to respond to 'parseltongue.'"

"Really?"

Rowena and Helga had each put their minds to developing all sorts of ways to get some of Salazar's ideas to work. He hadn't been sure what the others would think of building a castle fortress. With Anne's help they'd figured out how to afford it. Though turning it into a school was not the first thought for any of them. Turning the fortress into a magic school had been a combination of ideas. Rowena's dislike for the apprenticeship style of magic learning for the most part. After all, when she was 11 she had wanted to be a neurosurgeon, and she most definitely had moved on from that.

"Yes! I think this'll work great. Anne already claimed the area under the dungeons. I think all those centuries as a demon has really rattled her mind though. She actually thinks having their private chambers under the dungeons is sexy or something. I think I'm close to my solving my project too, what do you think?"

Helga looked over Rowena's shoulder at her notes. "I think it'll work. It's to make the staircases move if there is something dangerous nearby, right?"

"Yeah. To move our people to safety and disorient invaders."

"Won't something like that break down though?"

"Yes, eventually. I've got to come up with renewal spells, as long as they're reapplied every 10 years or so they'll be fine."

The two lovers put their heads together to put their fresh perspective on the other's project.

NEARBY

Godric smiled as he saw Rowena and Helga discussing something passionately. He'd been hesitant at first about both the fortress and school, but had seen how the children had all seemingly been brought to life by the idea. It was helping all of them recover from loosing Buffy and getting… misplaced.

A gust of wind had him grabbing for his hat as it blew off his head. He looked down at the hat in hands, Salazar had gotten it for him as a sort of gag gift but somehow they'd all ended up liking it on him. Godric tilted his head to the side as he contemplated it. He smirked, the others weren't the only one who could get ideas, and this was one that would be a welcome break from figuring out how to run a fortress and school. He chuckled softly to himself thinking, 'I bet I can even get it to sing.'

**End Chapter 6**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_I started this chapter strong and then got distracted by real life, boring real life at that. It sort of ended up more as an interlude than a chapter, it's so short. Hopefully the reviews will inspire me to work on the next chapter soon. *hint hint*_

_My other (completed) story, Dinner with Voldemort, got nominated for best Buffy X HP crossover in this year's crossing over awards! (Maybe it's a hint I should work on the sequel.) Thank you whoever nominated me. I was hoping to be nominated for something though I'm surprised it was for that. (I really liked the one shots I wrote last August.) I even nominated one of my competitors in this category! _


	7. Chapter 7: The Flashback: The End

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 7 – The Flashback: The End**

Salazar wrapped his arm around his wife, pulling her close. He smiled as he saw Rowena doing the same with Helga. Godric walked forward slowly, age having caught up with him, until he could reach out and touch the frame of the painting before them. Anne had had it commissioned as soon as the construction had finished on the castle. She'd become slightly sentimental due to her status of spawning at the time.

That her rapid mood swings had done wonders for Gringotts was a long story better not told. Though it did later become common fact in the wizarding world to not annoy a hormonal witch with an army of goblins. Muggleborns didn't get the reference, usually just shrugging and letting it go as some odd phrase. It's not like they got some of their phrases either, what does 'cute as a button' actually mean anyway? Even though that event was several years ago none of the founders knew that that conflict would go down in history as the first goblin rebellion, all previous conflicts being called wars.

"You're sure it's done and ready?" Godric asked, looking at Rowena over his shoulder.

She smiled softly, "It's been ready for over 7 years now. Helga and I have both gone over it several times and we've confirmed it each time. We've only been delaying this as long as possible until all of Salazar's children had finished school. We can no longer delay, the Hellmouth grows stronger every year. We almost failed this past year at stopping the apocalypse, as it is we lost several people in both the village and the school."

Anne turned away from the others to look behind them. The sorrow of loosing several people they had cared for and known since they were children hurt them deeply, although she was glad it hadn't been any of her children. Anne had no desire to see the pain of loss on the faces of her long time friends and instead chose to take in the sad faces of her children who stood just behind their parents and mentors. The four young adults looked on as those who raised them prepared to leave them to ensure that they and everyone else would remain safe.

Anne grabbed the hands of her oldest child, Hailey, her shoulders shook as she tried to suppress the sobs that threatened to consume her, determined to be strong for her siblings. "Spawn," Anne began to muffled half laughs from her children, "the only thing I want you to promise me is to spawn. I want a lot of grandchildren even if I won't be able to hold them."

"Ahn," Salazar said sighing, before reaching out and pulling Anne back into his arms, his arms circled around her. She never stopped, it wouldn't have been so frustrating if she hadn't started when Hailey turned 13. It didn't matter how much time passed, Anne never completely adapted to being human. Though it certainly made her popular in non-human groups. She'd even convinced some centaurs to move into the forest and help hunt demons. "We already said our goodbyes. We'll be able to talk to them later, once we're in the seal." Salazar said nodding his head towards the painting while gently turning Anne around so that they were facing it again.

Rowena took a deep breath and slowly let it out, "Let's do this!"

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

"Welcome once more to Hogwarts," Hailey called out to the chattering students. "I see you've all noticed that the founders are not here with us today. The five of them have sealed themselves into the Doorway so no one else may enter our world from there. If any ever succeed then they will return to once more defend our world. This I promise you."

The students turned to each other once more and started chatting about this. Their beloved founders were gone.

"The five of them can still be visited in the painting that will be kept in my office for now. My siblings and I would like to make some announcements now that the fighting against demons will no longer be common event. As you all know I finished my apprenticeship with Godric Gryffindor and in his honor I will be changing my name from Hailey Slytherin to Hailey Gryffindor. I am also changing the sorting hat to sort into his house the students that I feel best suit his nature. Those sorted into Gryffindor will no longer be sorted because they are soldiers but because they're brave. To me, Godric was a true hero."

"I am Daniel Slytherin, and like my sister I am changing my name. As the apprentice to Rowena Ravenclaw I will now be Daniel Ravenclaw. The sorting hat will no longer sort the researchers into Ravenclaw but rather those who love to learn, as she did."

"I am Jessica Slytherin, and like my brother and sister I too will change my name. I am now Jessica Hufflepuff in honor of my mentor Helga Hufflepuff. Now those who are sorted into her care will not be sorted because they are healers but because of the loyalty and their self character. Helga was always the one that kept the other founders from ever becoming like the monsters they hunted."

"I am Devin Slytherin, as I was apprenticed to my parents I will not be changing my name. I will be changing the nature of the sorting though. No longer will Slytherin house be sorted because of their ability to fight behind the scenes, the unsung heroes, those who do what they must no matter the cost to themselves, but instead because they are the cunning. And also the ambitious, those like my mother who strive to get things done."

"And make money while doing it," came a shout from one of the students. Other voices piped up shouting out the things they each admired the most about their teachers. Laughter and tears became the norm as stories were retold. The heirs of the founders watched with smiles on their faces as their family was remembered for all that they accomplished.

**End Chapter 7**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_I told you that the reviews inspire me. I know this was a little short like the last chapter, but now the flashbacks are over! Back to Harry Potter's time. This is when I need the inspiration from reviews the most. I only have a vague idea where I want to go from here. _


	8. Chapter 8: Ideas

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 8 – Ideas**

After several centuries living together, especially in the close proximity of the inside of a painting, most people would probably grow to greatly dislike each other. In fact Godric had been almost positive about that, that one day they would want to separate from each other. Rowena thought for sure that Anne would drive her mad. Though that might have had something to do with the fact that they regained their youth. Well sort of youth. Their ages having seemed to be set when they first began enchanting the painting. Although that was why Godric, Rowena and Helga all got sick of walking in on Anne celebrating her returned youth with Salazar. Anne had decided to 'christen' almost every room in Hogwarts.

Hogwarts. Rowena and Salazar still snickered sometimes when they thought about that name. Helga and Anne had both long gotten over that, while Godric had actually become quite embarrassed about the name as more time passed. Godric sometimes wished he'd voted against that name. Salazar's joke had been funny at the time, but as everyone outside their group just accepted the name, never questioning it, it bothered him even more. Sometimes he'd mutter about if he'd known the school would become the first and foremost school of magic in the world.

Not that it seemed foremost anymore. Rowena would complain every time she noted changes in the rules due to either the Ministry or the Board of Governors. As they looked outside the painting to see the castle in the real world hope rose in their chests, they could interact with the world again. The Founders had spent most of their lives outside the painting fighting for the world, and they were ready to fight once more.

Anne bite her lip softly, she had a couple of ides about how to deal with the current crisis with Voldemort. It was also perhaps a way to return Goblins to some more esteem, she was not happy about all the Goblin Rebellions she'd read about every several years. It had been awhile since the last one but she liked the Goblins, they were very straight-forward, like herself. It wasn't just because of her brilliant money sense that made her the only human to ever get into their higher administration. She pulled Salazar's head down to hers so she could whisper something in his ear. He looked surprised but nodded as she turned to run into the painting Hogwarts.

Salazar smiled as he realized just how much what she was going to do would change the world. He might never be as brilliant in the academic sciences or the magical arts as the others, but he'd become a brilliant strategist. He knew what Anne's plans would cause. Chaos. Ethan probably would have loved her. Salazar gave a quiet snort as that thought hit him. He looked over at Rowena and saw her face going into the very familiar resolve face she was quite well known for. He didn't know what she was planning yet but he couldn't wait to find out. He knew it would be awesome.

Indeed, the plans forming in Rowena's mind would be more than enough to make Salazar cackle like the stereotypical witch over her cauldron. This school was stagnant and she would not have it. She saw great potential in all the students and she wanted them to reach it. Hogwarts was called a great school of magic yet it hadn't changed much since right after they had been cut off from it. Sal had made many changes that the Founders as a whole disagreed upon. And if that man with the sneer truly was interested perhaps one of the first changes would be for the werewolves, Rowena had had plenty of time to work on her research and she knew she was close to truly helping them, perhaps with this man that solution would be well upon them. She would do this.

The determination and resolve on Rowena's face made Helga roll her eyes skyward for a moment. Helga often got stuck making sure Rowena got other important things done, like eating, when she got too involved in a project. Helga had become a great healer in her time. She'd been joyful discovering that she was very gifted in healing. She was hopeful that she'd be able to talk to healers again. One of the first things her original Hufflepuff class did when they graduated was found a hospital, she'd often visited it and gave guest lectures. St. Mungos was something Helga felt was a great investment, she'd managed to amass a great deal of money with Anne's help over the years, and funding that hospital was perhaps the most useful thing she ever did with her money.

Sometimes Godric disliked his position of leader, but it was something he'd had to do without Elizabeth there to take the lead. He knew that the women in his life would all focus on their own personal priorities; Hogwarts, St. Mungos, and Gringotts. Leaving him to deal with the Ministry of Magic. He knew Salazar would do his best to help all four of them, but regardless of his ability to settle out and out fights and arguments between the Lady Founders or among the students, politicians were another matter. Salazar was too straight forward, never dealing well with non-sexual innuendo. No, the inevitable problems with the Ministry of Magic were his to deal with. But he was good at it he thought to himself with a small smirk.

**End Chapter 8**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_My internet modem died a couple of days ago and I decided to upgrade my service. So no internet for a week (ended up being almost 2 weeks). I'm taking the time to write without interruptions. Sorry this seems very short. I wanted some more feedback before I started the next bit. I hope you enjoy._


	9. Chapter 9: Anne

_Buffy_ is owned by Mutant Enemy and _Harry Potter_ is owned by a lot of people… No copyright infringement is intended. Fanfiction is, in my opinion, free advertisement. There are many things I've bought because I enjoyed fanfiction that crossed into a new fandom. I encourage everyone to purchase these products.

**The Founding – Chapter 9 – Anne**

Harry merely gazed at the painting out of the corner of his eye as the others were carrying it up to the Headmaster's office. He couldn't help but wonder if he'd even be allowed to be here too if everyone hadn't slept last night. He wasn't even sure if anyone in the school would even know anything that the Founders had revealed. He doubted that Dumbledore would have brought it into the Great Hall if he'd been fully awake. And imagine that a man some considered the first dark lord was a muggle, and apparently a very nice one. Harry was kind of curious about what that would mean for the students in Slytherin.

He found it hard to hold back laughter as he watched the teachers trying to hold the large painting at the right angle to carry it into Dumbledore's office. It took them several minutes to get them all into his office. Dumbledore casually sat down at his desk before conjuring chairs for his many guests. The professors whop had done the manual labor of lugging the painting all the way up the stairs gently lent it up against the wall before falling into exhausted lumps into their chairs. Lupin and Snape were so tired that they even sat next to each other without even the slightest glare from either of them.

Dumbledore was about to open his mouth to begin the discussions when Godric Gryfindor beat him to it, "Perhaps you should summon the house elves to bring them something to drink?"

"Right," Dumbledore nodded before doing so. He turned his attention back to the painting and opened his mouth to talk.

"I wonder how Sal carried us from here all the way down to my chambers?" Salazar said speaking up. "I mean this took awhile, I know he waited until nightfall so we wouldn't be able to call for help or anything, but seriously… For that matter how did he do it without help? I mean we're pretty heavy…"

"That means he moved us with help. Perhaps his fiancé or her brother helped?" Rowena said with a frown. "They were believers in that whole pure blood superiority thing after all."

Salazar lifted his hand up to rub at his forehead. Some of his descendents were messed up. Really really messed up.

"Hey," Harry said as he took in the four people in the painting. "What happened to Mrs. Slytherin?"

"You can call her Anne," Salazar snorted. "Don't let her catch you calling her Mrs. Slytherin, it makes her feel old."

"Where is Anne?" Rowena asked looking around. She hadn't even noticed Anne leaving since she'd been so busy in her scheming.

"She went to get our family tree," Salazar explained. "She wants to verify that both 'Voldemort' and Harry are on it."

"Isn't that unlikely?" Lupin asked. "Harry might be a parslemouth, but neither of his parents were."

"How do you know?" Harry asked looking at Lupin.

Lupin paled, Dumbledore hadn't wanted him to let Harry know so soon that he'd been friends with his parents.

"They were both friends with Professor Lupin," Dumbledore explained softly. He hadn't wanted Harry to know about their connection because he knew Harry would eventually loose so many of the people already fighting this war. Probably even him. Harry needed to be able to fight on his own. Needed to find his own allies.

"Oh!" Harry felt conflicted. He didn't know how to deal with this. He didn't know whether to scream at Lupin for not being there or to hug him, he settled with shock, he'd figure it out later, when he had time to think and find out why he had never met Lupin before.

"There are actually a lot of people who are descended from myself and Anne. See this," Salazar reached out his hand to point at the frame.

Harry frowned as he remembered the plaques he'd seen when they'd first brought up the painting from the chamber of secrets. They'd been coated with dirt and grim. The only one that could be read was the one centered on the bottom of the frame the read 'The Founders.' Harry rose and moved over to see more clearly what was written on the side plaques. He brushed his thumb over the one Salazar was pointing at. "346," he read as he removed the grim.

"That is the current count for the number of living descendents I have," Salazar explained. "Anne's going to check the family tree to see if you're one of them."

"There is no way we have that many parslemouths right now!" Snape burst out rising from his own seat to loom over Harry's smaller body so he too could look at the specified plaque.

"Not all of my descendents are parselmouths. All of our children were, but only a few of our grandchildren were parselmouths."

"I theorized that it was being bred out of them," Rowena smiled sadly. "We call what happened a curse but it was actually venom from a snake like being that gave Salazar his ability. We think, well I think, that as it became diluted the ability was less likely to emerge."

"But it's believed that the Dark Lord's family has always had the ability. That wouldn't be possible if what you say is true," Snape glared, stepping back from the painting to return to his seat.

Salazar and Rowena exchanged looks as Helga bit her lip. Rowena reached back with her hand to gently scratch the back of her neck with a single finger. "Then I think I know where he falls on the tree and will be easy to find."

Harry frowned, his forehead wrinkling slightly. "Still, 346 is a lot of people."

"Well it's not like we ever removed people from the family tree. Magical or not, light or not, they're all family," Anne explained as she returned to the frame. "My last request to my children was to have children of their own."

"Technically it was to spawn," Rowena interrupted with.

Anne glared at her before focusing back at Harry, "Either way. We actually had more descendents 100 years ago than we do now. WWI, WWII, the wars with Grindelwald and Voldemort has severely cut into the number of my descendents running around and I'm not happy about that. Before WWI we had 612 people alive on our family tree. The one thing that never changes about our family is that they rarely can stand back and do nothing when they think they can help. They get that from Salazar. I'm all for self survival unless the world or ourselves are at stake."

Salazar pulled Anne into her arms, his arms wrapping around her front and kissing the back of her neck. Anne smiled gently before removing Salazar's arms from around her. She pulled out a small piece of parchment. "Rowena?"

Rowena smirked softly before waving her hands at first small before expanding on it to huge motions and the parchment fluttered from Anne's open hand to fly in the air before growing, almost convulsing, until it was huge. Harry wasn't ashamed to admit that he watched this with his mouth agape. The professors of course denied exactly how shocked they were. Enlargement charms were difficult to perform wandlessly and she also did some sort of flying and stabilizing charms too.

Salazar grinned broadly as he took in their surprise, "Rowena was the most powerful witch that had ever lived when we were around. She couldn't even use a wand, there wasn't one strong enough to channel her power. I wouldn't be surprised if she's still the most powerful witch ever."

"Not bad for a muggleborn with no formal education, huh?" Rowena said smiling over her shoulder at the room outside her home.

"So we're looking for a Harry Potter and a Voldemort right?" Anne said studying the large paper before them. The family tree was actually taller than any of the trees behind it. It mostly looked like a spider's web. Though some areas of it looked darker than others.

"Tom Riddle," Harry looked on fascinated. "That's his real name."

"Well here he is," Godric said where he stood. He'd walked right over to the one section of the family tree. It was one of the darker parts of the tree.

"That was fast," Salazar said walking over to look at it too. "Ah. I thought so too. It's because his family have all been parselmouths…"

"Yes. If his family has had the gift for so long then it was easy to assume he'd be on one of the denser sections."

"Denser?" Harry asked trying unsuccessfully to see what they were doing.

"The areas of the family tree that look darker are caused by lines intersecting over and over. In other words, inbreeding. It's probably only because of the magic in our line that they aren't coming out with birth defects and the like," Salazar shook his head sadly. He reached out with one hand and touched the name. "I'm surprised there haven't been squibs in the line. That's the normal result of trying to breed too much 'pure' blood into a line."

"Oh."

"It got depressing you know? We used to check the family tree occasionally to see how our family was doing, but then we'd see things like this. I've rarely looked at it for the past several centuries. During WWII it got depressing and almost everyone stopped looking. Anne is the only one who still checks on it. Keeping track of our 'spawn' and all."

"Which is why I found Harry so quick," Anne said cheerfully.

"Already? You're amazing Ahn!" Salazar moved from Godric's spot to where Anne was looking.

"Both of Harry's parents are part of the tree."

"What does that mean?" Harry tilted his head as if he could see the tree better at a different angle.

"It means your mom was from a line of squibs that descended from our line. Your dad was from a long line of magic tracing back to us. It means your," Anne looked back at the tree, "Aunt Petunia and Cousin Dudley are both from lines of squibs. It means a lot of things, including that I know how you can destroy 'Voldemort' once and for all."

"What?" came out for all the occupants listening in the real world. It would have sounded pretty cool if they'd all said that in unison or the same speed, but they didn't.

Anne smirked as she rose and walked to the painting's frame. Salazar smiled, Anne had gotten pretty good ideas while working with the Goblins and oh God were they brilliant. Salazar followed behind her and as she stopped he did too and wrapped his arms around her from behind, rested his chine on her shoulder, he so wanted to see the looks on their faces when Anne solved their problems.

"Now I need to speak to Harry alone," Anne announced as if there weren't any surprised eyes staring at her. Anne thrived on shocking people.

"I can't allow that," Dumbledore said, his voice came out a little higher and commanding than normal now that he could get a word in edgewise. "I must insist on staying. I have no way of knowing yet if Voldemort did something to you when he was a student here. There are also things that I suspect that you don't know."

Rowena frowned and moved forward to stand next to Anne, "This painting cannot be altered in any way, we made sure of that. … And what don't we know?"

"You think he has a horcrux, don't you?" Salazar said softly. "That's why you asked earlier if we were a horcrux."

Godric growled. "The invention of a horcrux is a perversion! I had though the children had destroyed all that research."

"My children," Salazar explained. "When it was discovered that someone had found a way to gain partial immortality by splitting their soul into pieces, our children hunted down those responsible and destroyed them, their horcruxes, and all their research."

"That accursed side product!" Godric muttered as he began to move back and forth behind the others. Helga went back and clasped his shoulder, calming his furious pacing.

"Side product?" Dumbledore had spent the summer researching horcruxes because of his suspicions about the diary Harry had destroyed, but he had read nothing of anything created.

"The dementors," Rowena's eyes misted slightly as she thought of them. "The poor people those mad men tested their theories on."

"People without souls, but with the desire to find what had been taken from them," Godric glared out of the painting. "Consuming the souls of others in an attempt to find one that fits."

"It was only because of them that we were able to help the kids find those responsible. We had already been concerned about the missing people when more began showing up like mindless drones," Rowena explained as she joined Helga, wrapping an arm around Godric's waist.

"I thought they'd destroyed everything," Salazar said thoughtfully. "Some of the grandkids were old enough to help out."

"You think one of them might have kept it?"

"Rowena, remember how reckless you once were when in search of knowledge and magic?" Salazar looked over his shoulder at his lifelong friend.

Rowena turned into Godric's body, his arms wrapping around his adopted daughter, "I remember how close I came to giving in to dark magic. If it weren't for all of you I might not have realized that knowledge for knowledge's sake wasn't worth the cost."

"You were a dark witch?" Flitwick asked speaking up for the first time. Harry looked over at his professor surprised, he'd forgotten he was there. Flitwick had been paying attention, learning like a true Ravenclaw. This news about his house's founder was the first to make him truly speak out.

"I am a master of soul magics. It's dangerous, it made me very weak to temptation. If it weren't for the others…"

"I'd learned the hard way," Godric said hugging Rowena to himself. "I was once a dark wizard. It was only when a good friend died because of the dark magics my friends and I were experimenting in that I decided to devote myself to the light magics. Only one friend continued in the dark magics, the others chose to throw themselves into the muggle world and forget magic existed."

"Oh," Flitwick murmured. The professors weren't sure what to think about this. All these things they were learning about the founders without any time to truly process, then this added revelation from the headmaster about Voldemort…

"We can deal with a horcrux," Anne said softly. "My plan will still work and I still wish to speak to Harry alone."

**End Chapter 9**

_REVIEWS INSPIRE ME _

_I think I'm actually close to finishing this story! Which sounds kind of weird with my knowing there will be 4 to 9 more chapters to go depending on how long a chapter ends up. I was going to write more to this chapter but it's already getting pretty long for me and I'm curious about what people think Anne's plan is. If you all have ideas that will fit in I'll add it to the story._


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